Spinal discs serve to cushion and stabilize the spine in addition to distributing stress and damping cyclic loads. The discs may become damaged due to injury or age and symptoms of a damaged disc may include severe pain, numbness or muscle weakness. Fusion is one method of reducing the magnitude of the symptoms of damaged spinal discs. The primary goals of fusion procedures are to provide stability between the vertebrae on either side of the damaged disc and to promote natural fusion of those adjacent vertebrae.
In a typical spinal fusion surgery, for example, a tissue retractor is used to create and maintain an operative corridor through a patient's skin to a target disc space. This retractor is secured to the operating table via an articulating arm. However, this arrangement can have disadvantages in that the retractor is registered to the table, and thus any movement of the patient (however slight) may shift the operative corridor slightly. This can create a delay in the surgical procedure as the surgeon must reestablish the proper operative corridor by repositioning the patient, often requiring additional fluoroscopy usage that wouldn't otherwise be necessary in order to verify positioning. Furthermore, even if the slight shift of the operative corridor does not require repositioning of the patient, often times there will be tissue creep into the operative corridor due to the split-blade nature of the retractor. Also, slight movement of the operative corridor may cause other anatomical interference with the retractor blades, such as ribs in a thoracic spine example, or the iliac crest in a lumbar spine example. Also, fixation to the spine creates a truly rigid fixation system. The present invention is directed at addressing the shortcomings of the prior art.